**Source:** Lenin Miscellany X, p. 331
**Date:** 1904-01-29

LETTER FROM G. V. PLEKHANOV
—
TO YU. O. MARTOV

takes upon himself all moral responsibility for his actions and, therefore, personally does not object to the publication of the votum" ("Protocols" of the Congress, Leningrad, 1924, p. 323).

8 V. I. Lenin here alludes to the following passage from Martov's supplementary report at the Congress of the League: "...Lenin invited me to join the editorial board, persuading me that he and I, being in agreement on most questions, would constitute a majority against Plekhanov" ("Protocols" of the Congress of the League, Geneva, 1904, pp. 65-66).

9 The page references in brackets indicated here to the protocols of the League Congress constitute documentary evidence of how decisively Plekhanov fought against the minority before the Congress and at the Congress of the League itself, and how he himself at that time defined this struggle precisely as "a struggle against gross violations of party discipline, against agitational methods that arouse only indignation," as "a struggle against anarchism and anarchical phraseology."

Lenin's notes concerning Plekhanov represent very valuable factual material for characterizing Plekhanov's position at the beginning of the split; on the other hand, they serve as a documentary-illustrative supplement to the present letter from Lenin. In view of all this, as well as in view of the difficulty for the reader to consult directly the protocols of the League Congress (which are available in libraries in limited numbers only in the 1904 edition), we reproduce in full the noted statements by Plekhanov as Appendix 2 to the present document (below, p. 339).

10 Here Lenin definitively indicates that by this time he had already begun work on the pamphlet "One Step Forward, Two Steps Back."

**Appendix 1.**

**LETTER FROM G. V. PLEKHANOV TO YU. O. MARTOV.**

Geneva, January 29, 1904

Esteemed Comrade!

Concerning the circumstances that accompanied Comrade Lenin's exit from the editorial board, I can say one thing: these circumstances, it appears, have become considerably effaced from his memory. I hasten to refresh his recollections.

He says: "The atmosphere of split after the League Congress descended so ominously that Plekhanov decided to co-opt the old editorial board." This is not accurate. According to the bylaws, Plekhanov had no right to "decide" this: co-optation could only be unanimous. I simply "decided" that the intransigence of the party centers was doing enormous damage to the party and that, therefore, timely concessions had to be made. And since I was convinced that Comrade Lenin would not agree with this, I "decided" to resign, which I communicated to Comrade Lenin. He either forgot or found it inconvenient to recall this.

"I foresaw," he continues, "that the opposition would not be satisfied with this, and I considered it impossible to redo the decision of the party congress to please a clique. Even less did I consider it permissible to stand in the way of a possible peace in the party, and therefore I exited the Iskra editorial board after no. 51, declaring at the same time that I do not refuse collaboration and do not even insist on the publication of an announcement of my exit, should good peace be established in the party."

This again is not accurate. When I told Comrade Lenin that I wanted to exit the editorial board, not considering it possible to support by my participation in it a policy of intransigence that was leading the party to ruin, Comrade Lenin objected: "No, it would be better if I exit, because if you exit, then everyone will say: obviously Lenin is not right if even Plekhanov has broken with him." The next day, Comrade Lenin signed his resignation.

Several days later, he came to see me and said that he regarded his exit from the editorial board not at all as a concession to the minority. "Just as Chamberlain," he added, "exited the ministry precisely in order to strengthen his position more firmly, so do I." I noted these words at the time, and from then on, when people tell me of Comrade Lenin's peacefulness, I recall Chamberlain, and when I encounter Chamberlain's name in the newspapers, I recall Comrade Lenin's peacefulness.

As for the question of bringing to public knowledge the fact of Comrade Lenin's exit from the editorial board, here are the relevant documents.

I.

Not sharing the opinion of Member of the Party Council and Member of the Editorial Board of the C. O., G. V. Plekhanov, that at the present moment a concession to the Martovist faction and the co-optation of the Group of Six is useful in the interests of party unity, I lay down my post as Member of the Party Council and Member of the Editorial Board of the C. O.

N. Lenin.

P. S. In any case, I do not in the least refuse modest support through my work of the new central institutions of the party.

II.

In the no. of Iskra with the announcement of the Congress, I request that you also publish my statement, attached herewith. Of course, in the event that full peace is established in the party (which I hope for) and if you find it necessary, I could, among other conditions for peace, also discuss the non-publication of such a statement.

November 18.
Devotedly yours, N. Lenin.

Text of the statement: To the Editorial Board of the C. O. of the R. S.-D. W. P.— Esteemed Comrade!

I request that the following statement be published in Iskra:

"N. Lenin has not been a member of the Iskra editorial board since November 1 (new style) 1903.

With socialist-democratic greetings, N. Lenin."

To me personally, the question of whether or not the reading public would learn of Comrade Lenin's exit never seemed important for a moment, but the final lines of the second letter showed me that Comrade Lenin himself ascribes enormous importance to this question and was ready to exchange his silence on this matter for a suitable equivalent. I was very surprised at this and